PHIL & TECH 1:1&2 Fall 1995 Anderson, Why Prometheus Suffers WHY PROMETHEUS SUFFERS: TECHNOLOGY AND THE ECOLOGICAL CRISIS Albert A. Anderson, Babson College Prometheus: Such are the inventions I devised for mankind, Yet have myself no cunning wherewith To rid me of my present suffering. 1 Human beings have been puzzling over the suffering which arises from technology at least since the middle of the fifth century B.C. Rather than blame technology, I believe that we should look to philosophy to determine why Prometheus suffers and what should be done to respond to the current ecological crisis. The benefits brought by Prometheus' "gift of fire" are well known. Because of him humankind has the knowledge of how to build houses "turned to face the sun," the ability to understand "the risings of the stars and their settings," the power to calculate with number and to combine letters in order to "hold all things in memory." Through this cunning we can "roam the sea," "mix soothing remedies" for illness, and bring precious metals from beneath the earth. "Hear the sum of the whole matter in the compass of one brief word—every art [techne] possessed by man comes from Prometheus." 2 Why, then, does Prometheus suffer? Aeschylus is wonderful in presenting Prometheus' agony, but he offers little help in understanding the real source of the problem. We are told that Prometheus defied Zeus, who had decided that the human race was a mistake. He was about to replace it with 3 another. But is it wrong to defy a willful, tyrannical ruler? It is hard to believe that the Greeks, who at that time were developing the world's first democracy, would settle for that explanation. We need to dig deeper. Plato tells the story somewhat differently. In his dialogue, Protagoras,